Ben Cousins has revealed that his time filming Dancing With The Stars has reignited his passion for sport.
The 45-year-old AFL legend says he missed the excitement of the competition and couldn’t get enough of it.
“I love the lifestyle of a professional athlete and I missed it,” he tells the Herald Sun.
“I really thought I would get the experience for six to eight, or ten weeks, and I would just wait for the days to pass. But it was completely the opposite.”
Ben went on to say that he didn’t want the experience to end.
“I remember it was a week before the show ended and I started to get sad. I didn’t want to go home,” he said.
‘When I think back, it still shocks me that that could have been the case. I fell in love with it, it was incredible’.
Ben has spent the past few years rebuilding his life after a fall from grace.
Ben Cousins has revealed that his time filming Dancing With The Stars has reignited his passion for sport. The 45-year-old AFL legend says he missed the thrill of competition and couldn’t get enough of it. Pictured with dance partner Siobhan Power
The footballer says he has been approached several times by Channel Seven’s SAS Australia, a broadcaster known for signing controversial public figures.
Ben has so far declined, but he has agreed to do Dancing With The Stars this year, explaining that focusing on a new challenge will help him rebuild his life.
The athlete tells the Herald Sun who previously agreed to the dance competition in 2008, but then changed his mind.
“I’m just in a good position right now and I’m able to take on some new challenges. And now that I’ve done this, I’m probably able to try it for the first time in a long time,” he said.
“I love the lifestyle of a professional athlete and I’ve missed it,” he told the Herald Sun
“This worked for where I was mentally and wanted to throw myself into something.”
Ben says there is no quick fix to rebuilding his life and he is willing to pay for it.
“I certainly haven’t forgotten how much hard work and dedication it took to get back to where I am today,” he explained.
‘It’s a matter of the long term. You don’t just do something and then it suddenly changes from one day to the next.’
Ben won the Brownlow Medal in 2005 and captained the West Coast Eagles from 2001 to 2005, winning the club’s best and fairest award four times during those seasons.
He played 238 games and scored 205 goals for the West Coast Eagles, winning a premiership with the club in 2006.
‘I really thought I would get the experience for six to eight, or 10 weeks, and I would just sit there and wait for the days to pass. But it was completely the opposite,” he added. Pictured in 2005
His dramatic fall from grace has been well documented since 2007, when he publicly battled drug addiction and tried to come to terms with his failed relationship with Maylea Tinecheff.
He was later dismissed and given a one-year ban by the AFL for repeated offences.
In 2021, Susan Backshell, who has mentored Cousins since his last prison sentence, told Ny Breaking Australia that he is still solely focused on his children.
When Cousins found himself in a cold, cramped cell for the sixth time in 13 years in 2020, he decided after seven months behind bars that enough was enough.
He told her he wanted to make amends and get his life in order, to which Backshell gave him an ultimatum: “Give it all you’ve got, or forget it all.”
Since Cousins was released in December 2020, Backshell said he has never wavered in his commitment to sobriety and his service to the community.
Last year, Cousins announced that he would be giving several lectures during his Such Is Life Tour, which kicked off in July.
The tour, which would reveal previously untold stories from his football career, was something of a catharsis for the controversial Brownlow Medal winner.
“I remember it was a week before the end of the show and I started to get sad, I didn’t want to go home,” he said